DVI seeks to withdraw offer for Metalyst Forgings

US-based Deccan Value Investors (DVI) has roped in former Tata MotorsNSE -0.51 % managing director Prakash Telang to support the plea to withdraw its Rs 1,600 offer to take Metalyst Forgings out of bankruptcy.

On Thursday, Telang filed an affidavit in the Mumbai bench of the National Company Law Tribunal, saying the visits allowed for DVI to inspect Metalyst’s plants were mere “walkthroughs” that did not give it enough time to judge the asset correctly.

Telang, along with former Tata Motors chief purchasing officer Bharat Parekh and former Bosch India joint MD Lakshmi Narayan M, had advised DVI on the drafting of the resolution plan for the stressed Amtek Auto subsidiary. DVI now wants to withdraw the proposal, claiming discrepancies in the information shared with the company and what existed on ground. Metalyst owes Rs 3,800 crore to lenders.

“There is a detailed affidavit of Telang filed today saying that this clearly was a two-hour exercise where you could just go and physically see (the plant), and (this) made it difficult to verify production capacity of every machine,” the counsel for DVI said in his arguments on Thursday.

However, senior counsel Fredun De Vitre, representing Metalyst’s resolution professional (RP), Dinkar Venkatasubramanian of EY, refuted the use of the term “walkthroughs” saying that in plant visits (under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code) “experts come and talk to people who are involved in manufacturing as well as meetings are set up”.